


New York Sewer Rats INC

by Ursula



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Episode Related
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-01-29
Updated: 2004-01-29
Packaged: 2019-02-05 14:11:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12796200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ursula/pseuds/Ursula
Summary: Christmas snippet





	New York Sewer Rats INC

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Haven, the archivist: This story was originally archived at [Fandom Haven Story Archive (FHSA)](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Fandom_Haven_Story_Archive), was scheduled to shut down at the end of 2016. To preserve the archive, I began working with the OTW to transfer the stories to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in November 2017. If you are this creator and the work hasn't transferred to your AO3 account, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Fandom Haven Story Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/fhsa/profile).

Notes: For Linda aka Yankee Starbuck aka Amazon X

 

 

Trudging through an unpleasant mixture of snow and...and...

 

Walter Skinner did not want to go there. All the colors of a mud rainbow were in the filthy mixture, yellow, blood red, and an abundance of shades of brown, all streaked with car exhaust black.

 

Narrowly avoiding an avalanche of melting ice, sliding from a store awning as if giving up hope, Walter muttered, "Mulder, Mulder, Mulder, it's always you."

 

How in the hell had Walter let Mulder persuade him to investigate what must be an elaborate joke?

 

The reports of human sized rats intervening in crimes all over New York City had only been covered in the sleaze rags and in a few columns written by raconteurs running short of material. Walter wasn't sure why he had let Mulder persuade him to hop on a plane to investigate...two days before Christmas.

 

Although it did give him an excuse to refuse the half dozen invitations from his sisters to attend family holiday events...

 

Walter remembered previous years when he and Sharon would attend. He would feel a pang of guilt when Sharon cooed over the latest child or grandchild to appear. He had regretted then what Vietnam and Agent Orange had done to his reproductive system. Later, it seemed a blessing that they had not had a child. Spender would have used the son or daughter against him.

 

Bitter as myrrh in his memory, Walter remembered his one Christmas visit to his favorite sister, Sarah, with the love that succeeded Sharon. 

 

His youngest sister, his funny, original, and slightly wild sister had stared for a moment when Walter introduced Alex as 'someone very important to my life'. The hesitation wasn't long enough to be momentous. Sarah had hugged Alex, making him blush so prettily that Walter wanted to grab him and kiss him.

 

Ah, that brief span of time when the world seemed to be as sweet and beautiful as a rose petal.

 

Oh, Walter had built a pretty fantasy of coming out. Ready to challenge the unwritten rule that openly gay agents were not welcome in the FBI. If his Don Quixote dream failed, Walter planned to dust off his old law degree and specialize in sexual discrimination cases. He had even talked to Alex about going back to school, adding a law degree to his Masters of Science in Computer Design. Alex had answered only with a kiss. Alex would never say much when Walter talked about the future. Perhaps he was not willing to lie about love. Part of Walter believed that. Part of him believed that it had been real until Alex's puppet masters pulled him away.

 

OooOooO

 

"Fuck," Walter growled as he slipped on a patch of slimy substances. He caught the corner of the building until he recovered his balance.

 

Damn Mulder.

 

It had been especially idiotic to agree to split up to cover more territory.

 

No wonder Scully had declined, citing her need to care for William and Emily. Walter could understand that. Getting the children back was a miracle and Scully was wrapped in a maternal haze so saccharine that it left an aftertaste after a visit to her domestic paradise. Even more so, Scully had a legitimate excuse to avoid another Mulder mania field trip to Bizzaro World.

 

Scully had softly patted Walter's arm and said it was a good idea for him to go. "Think of it as male bonding, Walter."

 

Maybe Scully had harbored a secret grudge.

 

Rounding a corner, Walter faced a group of teens. Black stocking caps shoved low, concealing beetling eyes and reducing the amount of visible pimples.

 

Puffing his chest, meeting their eyes with an alpha male confidence he didn't fully feel, Walter did not let his stride falter. He managed to get most of the way past them before one of the trouble makers yelled, "Hey, baldie, got a few bucks for us?"

 

Curtly, Walter said, "No." and kept walking, hoping for the best and wishing he had decided to carry his FBI issue gun on this unofficial mission anyway.

 

Someone grabbed for him. Walter managed to pull away and shoved his back to the wall defensively. The punks circled, none of them eager to get to near him. That would have soothed his ego, but he suspected he was going to be lucky to spend Christmas in an emergency room. A body bag seemed a likely outcome.

 

OooOooO

 

Two of the punks tackled him, trying to blindside him. Walter managed to walk the first head over heels. The melee became a clumsy ballet of fists, feet, and elbows. 

 

Bleeding from a cut above his eyes, Walter swayed, a bull elk defending itself from a pack of wolves. He knew he couldn't win the fight, but he wasn't ready to fall. He would go down fighting.

 

Loud, jarring music invaded the darkness along with a bright spotlight.

 

Even the muggers were distracted as the hunched outline of a rat appeared in the bright circle.

 

An unseen chorus sung.

 

"Ratman. Rat a rat a rat Ratman. Ratman!"

 

"Knock off," Walter dismissed, being old enough to remember wondering exactly how Batman and Robin changed into those skintight costumes so quickly.

 

His moment of nostalgia passed as the muggers tried for his wallet before fleeing.

 

Boff. Bap. Biff. Slam. Pow.

 

No, it wasn't Walter's mind supplying the comic book sound effects. One of the smaller rat creatures, one that seemed disinclined to join personally in the fray was supplying the sounds.

 

A very short rat with a crooked tail stood on a curb to slam a bat into a mugger. A tall rat kicked one mugger into la la land as a skinny rat jabbed another with a furled umbrella. Walter managed to take out two on his own before the world went a rosy shade of gray as Walter slumped back against the wall and slid into unconsciousness.

 

OooOooO

 

The world was upside down when Walter woke. Upside down and not right. Not right at all.

 

A whiny, somehow familiar voice said, "My damn tights have a run in them."

 

"Yeah, well, mine are baggy," another voice bitched.

 

A very polite voice said, "Dear Frohike, I think you have Langly's tights on again."

 

The hunched creature took off its head and peered around, stretching out the back of the garment, trying to see his size tag without removing the tights. "That could be. I thought they seemed a little long."

 

"The Gunmen..." Walter gasped. "But you're dead. I had you buried at Arlington."

 

"Yeah, cool," said the rat with the blond fur. It was Langly. It had to be. Even his rat head wore thick black-framed glasses.

 

"Really, I was touched," Byers said.

 

"You must have had to dig out some pretty gritty secrets to get that arranged," Frohike said in a gloating voice. "What else do you know, Mr. Skinner?"

 

"Um," Walter said. Then irritation winning over confusion by lots more than a nose, he yelled, "What the hell is going on here?"

 

"Well, it could be that we shortly could start showing scenes from your life and how you affected people around you," a husky voice said.

 

"But been there, done that," the Master Rat said.

 

"Krycek," Walter said, "You're dead too."

 

"Me and Auntie Em," Alex remarked.

 

"I must be in hell," Walter said.

 

"Nah, just in the rat hole and it won't be the first time you've been in one of those," the King Rat said, plunking his false head onto a handy stand. Unzipping the rest of his costume, Krycek stepped out, clad in tights and a muscle shirt.

 

Walter couldn't help noticing how well the crotch was filled. And the arm. He had time to notice the mutilation of his former lover in the handful of encounters after his disappearance and reemergence at Spender's command. Now both arms were exposed, both sweetly fleshed and muscled.

 

Pulling the tight material out of his crotch, Alex said, "Maybe we should rethink this tight thing."

 

Moving Walter's legs over, Alex flopped next to Walter on the couch. A moment later, Walter yelped as Alex pinched his ass hard.

 

"You know what I always wondered," Alex said. 

 

"What?' Langly asked.

 

"Well, I always thought if I was a superhero, I would not only reveal my identity to my main squeeze, I would bring him or her to my fortress of solitude and make him my sidekick," Alex said.

 

"Like I'm always saying," Langly said, "Man, you just don't get it. Superheroes aren't supposed to be happy. They have to be like sexually frustrated to have the motivation to get out there and risk their ass all over the place. Sex is like kryptonite to them."

 

Plopping Walter's legs back over his lap, Alex said, "Think Green Lantern and Kato. I bet Old GL was doing Kato as often as he could."

 

"What about Lois Lane and Superman?" Frohike asked. "Now he was getting some."

 

"That's only because he never really looked at Lex Luther," Alex replied. "Bald and beautiful."

 

"You're a sick pup," Frohike said.

 

A smirk was the man's only reply.

 

"Is anyone going to tell me what's going on?" Walter said.

 

"Sure, dude," Langly said.

 

"See, we were getting a little high profile, a factor we shared with our friend and fearless leader," Langly added.

 

"It seemed wise to find a way to remove the pressure from our lives," Byers said. "Why don't I make some fudge while my friends fill you in?"

 

"Fudge," Langly said, "Yeah, do it, Byers."

 

"I believe I said I would," Byers said mildly.

 

Walter's eyes trailed after Byers as the trim man trotted out of sight through the doorway. He felt as if the only other sane man in a room of lunatics had abandoned him.

 

Frohike had also removed his costume. Of course, his black tee shirt was emblazoned with a picture of a fierce looking Mother Jones and a quotation, "Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living."

 

Frohike plopped onto another couch that looked suspiciously like the one that used to bring down the tone in Mulder's old apartment. He wiggled his black stocking clad feet, which were emblazoned with rats and the inscription, New York Sewer Rats.

 

"So the guys and I concluded we needed to go deep undercover and, when I was doing some research, I stumbled upon some interesting information about Ratboy there. Enough to make me think he would be interested in disappearing with us. So Langly and I managed to track the dude down," Frohike said.

 

"It was great timing. I knew that my days were numbered. I found out that Spender had survived his little trip and crawled out of hell. He was a bit peeved with me," Alex said. "I never thought about having partners, but, hey, even Superman must have thought about having company in his fortress of solitude. I arranged my accident...sorry about that gruesome little skit, Walter. Then I set it up for the guys as well. And here we are, deep under the New York sewer, in a bomb shelter guaranteed to survive anything from an earthquake to nuclear holocaust. We have a collection of the finest wine, a library of comic books that would make an ordinary collector die of envy, and the finest surveillance equipment in the world."

 

"And all that's missing is..." Alex said.

 

"Mulder," Langly announced.

 

"That was not what I was going to say," Alex bitched.

 

"No, doofus, Mulder just stumbled upon our secret entrance in the New York Library. Here, look..." Langly said.

 

The big screen lit to show Mulder, legs spread wide, whirling down a seemingly endless tunnel. 

 

"He does have a nice ass," Frohike remarked.

 

"Which I am going to kick," Alex said, "If he screws up my big plan for a romantic Christmas and New Years with my man."

 

Things were looking up.

 

Walter reached out, grabbed an arm full of Alex and brought him down. A swift wrestling move brought Alex beneath him.

 

Growling in his best testosterone high fashion, Walter said, "Don't worry about Mulder. We can decide what to do with his ass later. Right now, you need to worry like hell about what I'm going to be doing to your tush."

 

"What me worry?" Alex answered. "Ravish me. It's been so long I think I grew another cherry."

 

With that Walter managed to pick up an arm full of rat. Preceded by a rose petal tossing Langly, Walter headed for the Rat Prince's bedroom.

 

Just as he kicked in the door, Walter heard, "Frohike? Byers? Samantha? Samantha! And my old couch. I can't believe it. My sister AND my old couch!"

 

Shrugging and pushing Langly out the door, Walter said, "We really have to get Mulder a life. But it can wait."

 

The room darkened except for a lava lamp which cast dancing lights patterned like fireworks over the walls, Walter proceeded to ravish his rat.

 

OooOooO

 

Somewhere in New York City, a little old lady who was coming home from an emergency room was surrounded by muggers. Before she could scream, a light projected in a circle.

 

Outlined by the light was a two backed rat.

 

The little old lady heard, "Take it, guys, Walter and I will be with you in a minute."

 

And New York Sewer Rats Incorporated was to the rescue.

 

The End.


End file.
